Daddy Lessons
by myLITTLEnekoSHIRO
Summary: When men like them come around, you gotta know when to take a stand. Inspired by Daddy Lessons by Beyonce


**Just a little something on my mind I needed to let out**

'Grimmjow…'

'Walk away.'

'Just listen to me.'

'Turn around. And walk away. Or I'll blow your brains out.' Grimmjow clicked the safety lever of the shotgun, aiming right between Aizen's eyebrows.

The man smiled, bemused, raising his arms up as if surrendering. 'You won't shoot.'

'Try me.'

'You won't.'

'You don't know that.'

'I do. Because I know you. Grimmjow, come on. It's me.'

That didn't mean anything to him. And why should it? This man disappeared six years, without a damn word or letter explaining anything, and expected all to be forgiven just because he was standing on Grimmjow's front porch? That didn't mean shit. Aizen was a liar, a thief, and a damned all-round asshole who deserved a bullet in the skull. And Grimmjow had half a mind to give it to him.

'Why'd you come back?' Grimmjow growled. Despite his tough guy exterior, he was shaking a little. Sometimes, the worst damage wasn't on the outside.

Aizen smirked. 'I missed my boy,' he said tenderly.

Grimmjow flinched. But he kept his gun trained on the man. 'I missed having the opportunity to kill you.'

The older man laughed in amusement. 'Still so blunt,' he remarked. 'It's what I've always admired about you. I wish I could've been like that.'

 _If you had then we wouldn't be here now, would we?_

Where did it start? Or was there really a concrete beginning and ending?

It probably started with this gun. Aizen had taken him out to practice. 'Every boy needs to know how to shoot a gun,' he had said. So he had lined up some empty tin cans and told Grimmjow to shoot.

It was when Grimmjow missed for the tenth time that he clicked his tongue, came around behind Grimmjow and held his arms up to aim properly. 'Like this,' he had whispered in his ear.

He remembered shivering, feeling his breath on his ear. It was an odd feeling. He didn't know if he was supposed to feel that way. Wasn't it supposed to be wrong? To feel that way about a man?

After that, he was always aware of Aizen. He felt it on his skin, a heat prickling up that warmed his ears and face around the older man. Aizen would notice a couple of times and tease, saying it was the alcohol they were drinking. Grimmjow would've accepted that if he didn't feel the same heat at night, without a drop of alcohol in his system.

Then there was the touching. Oh, it drove Grimmjow crazy when Aizen would brush his fingers over his palm when they would be switching positions for balling. When he would lean in close to teach him how to grip the bat to hit a curveball. When he would muss up Grimmjow's head whenever he aced a test in school. And he knew Aizen did it on purpose. There was a glint in his eyes whenever he did that. At first, Grimmjow thought it was a playful glint. But over time, he realized with a sinking feeling it wasn't playful: it was greed.

Slowly, what Grimmjow thought was them getting closer, was him being wrapped around the man's finger. Anything Aizen wanted, Grimmjow wanted to be the first to give it to him. He would tag along to baseball games, bars, night walks. If Aizen was going, Grimmjow was sure to be there. His mama told him he didn't have to but Grimmjow felt obligated. Aizen made him feel…wanted.

'Grimm,' Aizen asked him one night while they were walking. 'Why do you do everything I do?'

Grimmjow shoved his hands into his overall pockets. 'I just wanna,' he mumbled, eyes on his feet.

Aizen laughed. 'You're such a kid,' he mused.

'Am not!' Then Grimmjow realized he sounded like one and blushed furiously. He was grateful it was nighttime. 'It's just…I wanna be more like you.'

Aizen looked up at the midnight blue sky flecked with winking stars. 'More like me, huh?'

He stopped walking. Grimmjow did the same. They silently just stared up at the sky for a bit. There was a perk to living out in the countryside Grimmjow always bragged about: you were always surrounded by wild, untamed beauty.

'Grimm,' Aizen said suddenly. 'What's your daddy always taught you?'

'Uh…' Grimmjow scratched his head. 'Your mama is always right even when she's not?'

'Well, yes, but…about men. What's he said about them?'

Grimmjow suddenly had a vivid flashback of being sat on a knee, and looking up in childlike wonder into a stern face. And a comforting voice washing over him.

' _Men will always try to steal something from you. Sometimes they'll take it without even asking. Don't let 'em, Grimm. And if they do, shoot 'em. Just shoot 'em.'_

'Shoot 'em,' Grimmjow echoed.

Aizen closed his eyes. 'Grimm?'

'Hmm?' Grimmjow looked at him. That's when Aizen leaned in and kissed him.

A lot happened that night. Grimmjow remembered pain. He remembered tasting dirt and wondering how he was going to wash the grass stains off his knees. He also remembered words like, "turn over", "fuck", and "kiss me".

But what he remembered the most, what was forever embedded in his mind and burned into his eyes, was how there was nobody there the next morning. They had fallen asleep under a tree, Grimmjow curled up in his arms like it was the safest place in the world, only to wake up alone.

For a while he had been confused. He'd be back. He'd just gone for some business. He'd be back. He had to.

The nights were the hardest. There was nothing to distract him. Nothing to preoccupy him except his thoughts. Thoughts of how he was so dirty which was why Aizen left him. Why else would he leave without a word? He was dirty. He was disgusting. Who would want to be around a person like that?

Then came the anger. The boiling rage of being abandoned and used and manipulated. His mama would walk into his room only to walk back out, defeated, after watching her son destroy everything before crying to sleep.

'He's still a boy,' she would say to his older brother, Stark. She never kept her voice down. Like she wanted Grimmjow to hear her. Wanted him to know she was on his side. 'He looked up to him. He feels abandoned.'

'Still,' Stark would say back. 'He's not the only one.'

Stark never pitied him. He felt it was a waste of time to depend on someone. 'You make your own life,' he would say. 'You don't expect someone else to make it for you.'

One day, Grimmjow finally left the house. He grabbed the old shotgun that was gathering cobwebs in the corner. He fished out a couple of tin cans from the garbage, went out in the field, and began shooting. He didn't miss a single one. That was the first time he had picked up the shotgun since Aizen left. It took him three years to finally do that and another three to piece his life back together. And right when he put the last piece in, there was someone standing in front of his house. And it was the last person he had wanted to see.

Grimmjow had frozen on the porch. He had been wittling out a little wooden doll for his little sister, Lilly. Aizen had smiled. 'Hey, there,' he had said cheerily. As if he had just gone to get groceries and came back.

'What're you doing here?' Grimmjow had finally said quietly.

The smile dropped a little. 'I'm here to fix things.'

'It don't need fixing. And it don't need you fixing it.'

'Grimm…'

'Don't call me that.' His hand was curling around the gun at his feet.

'Grimmjow…'

'Walk away.' He now had the gun trained on him. And here they were.

Aizen sighed. 'I'm trying here.'

'What you did was wrong.'

'I know.'

'You hurt… _a lot of people_.'

'I hurt you.'

'You _hurt_ the people I love. And I can't forgive you for that.'

'I did it out of love.'

Grimmjow blinked. 'Love?' he said incredulously. 'You did it out of "love"? You don't know jackshit about love.'

'And you do?'

Grimmjow willed himself not to squeeze the trigger right then. He was egging him on. He was reaching for that thread that pulled Grimmjow to him. He thought it was still there.

A fist clenched around Grimmjow's heart. Was it really still there?

'Come on, Grimm.' Aizen laughed. The sound felt like Grimmjow was being dragged over glass. 'You wanted it. I just gave you what you wanted. Was that so wrong of me?'

He thought back to those nights when he couldn't sleep. When he would sit in the bathtub and scrub and scrub and scrub because he thought he was so dirty.

 _You didn't give me anything. You_ took _the one thing I respected about you, and burned it like it meant nothing to you._

'My daddy warned me about men like you,' Grimmjow said calmly. He no longer felt a boiling rage. He was facing his demons. And he was going to face them like a man. He brought the gun back up so it was level with Aizen. '"Shoot 'em," he told me. And that's what I intend to do.'

Aizen sighed, closing his eyes. He hadn't dropped his hands once. 'That I did,' he murmured. He opened his eyes and smiled. Not a malicious smile. To Grimmjow's surprise, it was almost a gentle smile. 'Guess I better get going. I know when I'm not welcome. Tell Harribel I said hello.'

He turned around and walked away. And kept walking until Grimmjow couldn't see him anymore. He dropped the butt of the shotgun on the wooden porch and leaned against it. He squeezed his eyes shut and inhaled sharply.

 _Shit. Shit, shit, shit. I almost shot him. I almost killed him. I wanted to kill him._ He gripped the gun tightly. _Does that make me as bad as him?_

'Grimmjow?'

He turned around. Behind the screen door was a middle-aged woman with short blonde hair. She came outside and cupped his face.

Grimmjow leaned into the cool hand, realizing how hot his face felt. Her touch eased all the tension in his body. She always had that effect. 'I'm fine, mama,' he murmured. She was still looking at him with concern. 'He's gone.'

'I know, baby.'

'Mama, I could've-'

'You didn't.'

'But I _wanted_ to…'

She held his face in both her hands and kissed his forehead. 'But you didn't.'

It suddenly occurred to Grimmjow that for the last six years, he had never bothered to ask how his mama felt. She had to bear the burden of keeping face to the rest of the town that her husband had left her. She had to find work to put food in their bellies and clothes on their back. And through all that, she had to watch her son suffer from the very act she had sworn to protect them all from.

His face colored in embarrassment, and he suddenly hugged her fiercely, taking her by surprise. How could he have been so selfish?

'Mama, I'm sorry.'

'For what, baby?'

'That I never asked about you.'

'You weren't expected to.'

'Why didn't you say anything?'

She pulled him away and smiled. 'Because there were more important things I had to worry about.'

'Love you, mama.'

'I love you too, baby.'


End file.
